


Cork High, Bottle Deep

by corngold



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Alternate Universe, Avon Angsting About Everything, M/M, Post Gauda Prime, Spin the Bottle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-05
Updated: 2014-01-05
Packaged: 2018-01-07 13:40:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1120511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/corngold/pseuds/corngold
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Their reunion on Gauda Prime didn't go as well as either Blake or Avon might have hoped, and ten days later, they've still barely spoken.  So when opportunity presents itself, in the form of an empty bottle and a very silly group of rebels, Blake decides to do something drastic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cork High, Bottle Deep

**Author's Note:**

> References the BFA "False Positive." Events of the episode 'Blake' are tweaked.

The message in the bottle had worked for them once before, and though the mission itself had been a mixed success, it made for a good story.  Blake had told it only twice: once in a hospital to a stranger, and again years later, to his small group on Gauda Prime.  They’d been sitting around the base, drinking bottles of hephezoiden in the meagre light of the computer consoles, and Jacob had asked Blake for a story from the ‘glory days.’  Deva had looked at Blake nervously, unsure whether a reminder of the past would be welcome.  Blake had taken a careful sip from his bottle and, with the image of Avon’s eyes in his mind, had chosen that story.

It had swiftly become a favourite of Blake’s new group.  A year later Vila, upon discovering this, had taken to retelling it, adding embellishments he described as ‘improvements’ until the tale was hardly recognisable.  Avon had protested only once, when Vila attempted to introduce a dragon into the plot line.  Blake, when his disbelieving group had looked to him for confirmation, merely smiled and shook his head.

~*~

It had been Dayna who had suggested using the bottle again, or rather, its technology.  Their attack on the nearest Federation base the week before hadn’t gone as smoothly as it might have.  Afterward Dayna had pointed out that in future raids, they could use all the help they could get.  Particularly, for example, bombs that could be programmed to track their own prey, and then left to it.  

It had been Avon who’d created and programmed the bottle the first time.  Blake had looked to him for his opinion, but Avon had remained silent.

Since the shootout at Blake’s headquarters, they’d taken their operation into the forest.  Blake sat with his back to a log and a gun within easy distance and set about recreating the bottle.  Avon sat some feet away to Blake’s left, stripping a Federation rifle down to its component parts, and then further, with meticulous concentration.  Blake wondered for what seemed the hundredth time in the last ten days whether he ought to confront Avon—about the confrontation in Blake’s base, about the silence now, about the last two years, about the tension between Avon and his crew, about Cally, about the _Liberator_ , about the future, about what Avon might have planned that had brought him to Gauda Prime.  About what Avon might have _wanted_ that had brought him to Gauda Prime…

There was no dearth of subjects to choose from.  Instead Blake smiled at Dayna, where she sat across from him.  She watched with interest as he set about constructing the bottle.  He kept his eyes on his work, explaining the process briefly here and there.

“Now that’s interesting,” said Vila’s voice from over Blake’s head, and Blake paused to look up.  “I didn’t get to see, the first time,” he continued, crouching down.  “Can I just advise, as a professional—”

“A professional _what_ , Vila?” Dayna asked, her smile unimpressed.  “I didn’t think you had any background in computerised weapon programming.”

“Not in programming, in de-programming.”  Vila ignored the teasing with practiced dignity.  “If someone managed to catch it without it going off—”

“Unlikely,” Avon cut in shortly.  They turned as one to look at him, but his eyes were fixed on his own work.

“—if they _did_ , it would be the work of a moment to reprogramme it.  They’d send it right back at you.  But if you just add a little something here…”  Vila disconnected the computer chip from the bottle, tossed the latter aside, and set about explaining lock bluffs and poking at the chip, sometimes less than helpfully, whenever Blake was about to make an adjustment.

Jacob and Klyn strolled past and settled down nearby.  After a few minutes Dayna began to offer suggestions as well.  Blake put up with it good-humouredly, in no particular hurry to finish the thing and happy enough that his people—or were they Avon’s people?—seemed to be enjoying themselves.  Moral had been low of late, and the atmosphere tense.

Which was why, when Zakar, Miln and Tarrant wandered past and Zakar caught sight of the abandoned bottle at their feet and exclaimed, “Oh, we playing spin the bottle, then?” Blake had no reaction, beyond immediate surprise, but amusement.

“Come on!” Zakar continued, sitting and dragging Miln down beside him.  He reached for the bottle, paused to glance up at Blake, and said, “All right with you, boss?”  

The temptation to turn his head and see what Avon thought of it—if Avon had even heard—was incredibly strong.  Blake blinked at Zakar instead, amused himself briefly with imagining what Avon’s expression might be like, and nodded, feeling half benevolent leader and half curious bystander.  

Zakar grinned.  “Excellent.”  He grabbed the bottle and set it spinning on the leaves.  It skidded a few inches, hit a protruding tree root, and halted, pointing at Vila.  

Vila gulped and put up a hand.  “Now hold on a minute—”

Zakar leaned across the bottle, grabbed Vila by the hand and tugged him into a kiss.  Vila flailed and squeaked in protest.  Zakar released him almost immediately, and Vila wiped his sleeve across his mouth, expression horrified.  Blake hid a smile.   

“You’re next, Miln,” Zakar prompted.  Miln returned the bottle to the centre of their ragged circle and spun it.  It pointed to Zakar, and she wrapped her hands around his face and kissed him.

“Oh, romance?” said Leonard mildly as he passed, arms piled high with a jumble of tech.  He set it down behind Miln and stretched his arms over his head, back cracking audibly.  “Can I play?”

“The more the merrier.”

“Excellent.”  Leonard insinuated himself between Dayna and Tarrant, who was still standing uncertainly at the edge of the group.  “Come on, Tarrant,” he said, “sit down, then.”

“Well,” said Tarrant, looking round at them all as if wondering whether he should make a run for it.

“Yes, come on, Tarrant,” Dayna said, smiling wickedly.  

Tarrant blinked and looked to Blake.  “Weren’t you making some kind of bomb?” he asked.  “This doesn’t seem terribly practical.”

Blake hesitated, and then shrugged.  “It’s...I don’t have a problem with it,” he said delicately.  “In principle,” he added hastily.  

Miln took Tarrant’s hand and tugged him down to the circle as Tarrant opened his mouth to protest again.

“Don’t worry, Tarrant,” Leonard teased him.  “If it’s your first kiss we promise not to rate it out of ten.”

It worked: Tarrant’s shoulders went back automatically and he scowled.  He reached for the bottle and spun it, and it slowed gradually to point at Klyn.  Looking a bit embarrassed, she smiled and presented her face to be kissed.  Tarrant, cheeks flushed, leaned across and pressed his lips to hers quickly.  

Leonard reached out and spun the bottle.  It whirled and slowed to point at Zakar, who leaned behind Miln for his kiss.  Dayna took her turn with the bottle next.  It pointed back to Klyn, who blushed as pink as Tarrant had and let Dayna kiss her.  Blake, leaning back against the log and turning the forgotten computer chip over and over between his fingers, waved them on, ignoring the protests and teasing from his people, and Vila spun the bottle.  It pointed at Tarrant, and Vila, paying no heed to the clamours of ‘Cheat! Cheat!’ re-spun it.  It pointed between Tarrant and Leonard, and Vila screwed his eyes closed and kissed Leonard.

At a nudge from Vila, Klyn spun the bottle, which pointed right back at her.  She spun it again and it pointed slightly to her left, and she kissed Jacob on the cheek.  Jacob spun it to face Leonard.  Zakar spun it to face Dayna.  Miln spun it to face Klyn, who looked increasingly flustered and offered Miln her cheek.  Miln licked sloppily up her cheekbone, laughing when Klyn gave a muffled shriek.

Tarrant, slightly more at ease after a round of watching the rest of them mess about, spun the bottle with more force.  It whirled across the leaves and slowed to point at Blake.  Tarrant’s face went pale, and then pink all the way up to his ears.  Everyone in the circle paused and looked at their leader to see what the verdict would be.  

Blake coughed, lightly embarrassed, wondered whether Avon might be watching, and then mentally shook the thought from his head.

“You said you had no problem,” Zakar reminded him.  Jacob stifled a laugh, and Klyn elbowed him.  Tarrant blushed harder.  Blake shrugged, smiled his best enigmatic smile, and lifted an eyebrow.

Tarrant, quite obviously gathering his dignity as best he could, leaned forward on hands and knees and paused, waiting for Blake to lean forward and meet him halfway.  Blake, though, feeling suddenly remarkably comfortable and slightly wicked, didn’t move from his sprawl against the log.  He raised a hand and crooked a finger at Tarrant.

Face flaming, Tarrant moved the rest of the way in until, hovering awkwardly over Blake and with one arm propped against the log, he was close enough for a kiss.  His lips were remarkably soft, and full, Blake thought, in the split second they pressed against his.  Then the group was whooping as Tarrant pulled away and settled back between Miln and Leonard, looking as if he wanted the earth to swallow him.  

Leonard spun the bottle, but Blake didn’t notice whom it stopped to point at.  Underneath the noise the group around him was making, he heard a thump, a loud crack, and then the shifting of leather on leaves, several feet to his left.  He snuck a glance at Avon out of the corner of his eye, but couldn’t get a good enough look to be able to tell what he was thinking...or even which direction he was looking.  

Blake _didn’t_ have any issue with romance, in theory or in practice.  He was celibate by choice, though it was not a choice based on principle.  There had certainly been moments when he’d hoped—hoped desperately.  Each of his hopes had been consistently dashed.

In the days on the _Liberator,_ hope had been his currency.  It had been his prized possession, his most potent weapon.  A people who hoped were a people unbeaten, and so he’d given it freely, to as many as he could.  Avalon, Ro.  His uncle, his cousin.  Jenna, Gan, Cally.  Vila, even.  Avon.

Blake turned the computer chip over and over between his fingers and let the good-natured laughter and catcalls slide away from him.  Avon had planned to leave him right from the start.  Yet he’d rescued Blake from Cygnus Alpha, from XK-72, from Horizon, from Travis, from himself.  Each time, the hope that had tightened Blake’s lungs, and the wash of empty disappointment that had followed, had been devastating.  At the very end, Blake had come as close as he dared to asking how Avon felt about him.  And then he’d come as close as he dared to telling Avon how he felt, and then he’d left.  

And Avon had not come back for him, that one last time.

Most of Blake’s new group were in awe of him.  They were, on the whole, young, energetic idealists, impressed with freedom and impressed with Blake.  They listened to his stories and tripped over themselves agreeing with his plans as though the sun shone whenever he opened his mouth to speak.  It made him feel old.  Old and tired.  And imperfect, oddly enough.  Perhaps he just longed to have someone to argue with.

Deva knew about Avon.  Blake rarely spoke about his old crew, but somehow Deva knew anyway.  Maybe he’d once been in love himself, Blake mused.  Maybe he looked at Blake and could recognise the way it chipped away at you, until everything seemed painted in a maudlin kind of loneliness.

A sudden presence, a person pressed up into his space and a kiss pressed to his cheek, below his battered eye, startled Blake out of his self-sympathy.  The group of players had grown while he’d been lost in his own thoughts: Inga, Grant, Allina and a nervous-looking Deva had joined.  They’d brought a jumble of small plastic cups, a bottle of moonlit A&S, and a supply of the ever-present hephezoiden, and the party had grown rowdier.  Allina was scooting back across the clearing to her place—she must have been the one who’d kissed Blake’s cheek.  He shook his head at her grin and went back to idly studying the computer chip.  The original had been a good piece of technology.  Deva was was a good friend, and a good technician.  He was clever, and remarkably resourceful, but he lacked Avon’s flair for showy genius.  Of course, he was less of a showman than Avon.  Everyone in the galaxy, Blake reminded himself, was less of a showman than Avon.  Avon had always deeply enjoyed suggesting, by any means at hand, that he was the smartest in the room.  He’d always enjoyed astonishing them all with a truly dramatic stunt…

Blake blinked down at the tech in his hands, feeling the beginnings of a mad idea forming in his brain.  A dramatic stunt.  He smiled, laughed a little at the absurdity, and set to reprogramming the chip.

He was nearly finished when the noise level rose abruptly and jolted him out of his work.  The bottle, when he glanced up, was pointing his direction once again, and he looked around the group to see whom he might expect a kiss from next.  Leonard was clapping Tarrant on the back and howling, a little drunkenly, with laughter.  Miln was shoving at Tarrant from the other side, grinning ear to ear.  Tarrant had undergone something of a transformation and was grinning too, though his cheeks were still flushed.

“All right, Blake?” he asked, with bravado that seemed only a little bolstered by alcohol.  Blake, unwilling to spoil their fun and, if he had to admit it, thinking it might play into his hand, nodded.  

In the next second he upped his estimate of the number of drinks Tarrant might have had from one to possibly two or three, as Tarrant crawled across the clearing, knocked aside the knee Blake had been resting his elbow on, straddled his lap and pressed his lips full to Blake’s.  Blake heard a muffled noise of surprise escape his own throat, thankfully drowned under the shrieks of laughter from his people—really, it was lucky their new base was both well hidden and well guarded, or they might lead the Federation right to them by noise alone—and he grasped at Tarrant’s shoulder for balance.  In the next second, Tarrant had pressed his chest to Blake’s, tilted Blake’s head back against the log, and slid his tongue past Blake’s lips and into Blake’s mouth.  The laughter changed to wolf-whistles, and he heard clapping.

It was quite a good kiss, really.  Almost as good as it was surprising.  Blake felt a faint, instinctive thread of interest lace through his veins, in time with his heartbeat, and then he thought of Avon watching and the interest snapped into focus as arousal and he was very, very pleased Tarrant was actually keeping his own body far away from Blake’s groin.  

In the next second he pulled himself together.  Personal pride and a kind of crazy elation demanded he stop being a passive participant.  He wrapped his hand around Tarrant’s neck, tilted his head, opened his mouth wider, and sucked at Tarrant’s tongue.  

It was Tarrant’s turn to make a muffled noise of surprise.  His grip slipped on the log and he pressed closer—and then Blake pushed his face away, put his hands to Tarrant’s chest, and shoved him good naturedly back toward the ring of people.  Tarrant looked dazed, and a tiny bit impressed.  Blake, wondering whether he might be going too far, winked at him.  Tarrant blinked, and then laughed and settled back between Miln and Leonard.

There was an abrupt sound from Blake’s left—the snapping of plastic and a rustle of leaves—and Blake had only a second to feel guilt and wonder if he’d made a mistake before Avon entered his line of sight, stalking past the group toward the camp centre.

“Avon!” cried Leonard, thoroughly drunk.  “Where are you going?  Come join us.”

Avon froze, and then turned.  Blake held his breath, but Avon didn’t meet his eyes.  Deva, Tarrant and Grant looked varying degrees of nervous and uncomfortable; Klyn looked worried; Dayna stared at Avon with aggressive curiosity.  Beside Blake, Vila was tense.  The others looked obliviously expectant.

“Thank you all the same,” Avon said finally.  Blake made a final, swift adjustment to the chip, and saw Avon’s eyes flick briefly to his hands and then away.  The corner of Avon’s mouth twisted into a sneer.  “It’s been quite a long time since I’ve wanted to kiss anyone.”

Grant’s jaw tightened.  Deva winced.  Dayna glanced at Blake.  

Tarrant looked even more nervous.  “Look, Avon, I’m—”

“Excuse me,” Avon cut him off smoothly, voice like steel, and turned his back.

Blake reached forward and slid the chip into place.  “Avon.”  Avon halted again and half turned back, and Blake spun the bottle.

It spun quite a few times and then stopped, without slowing first, to point resolutely at Avon.  Avon stared at the bottle, and then at Blake, his expression unreadable.  Blake got to his feet, and stepped over the bottle, and Avon’s mask broke.  Indecision, wariness and something vulnerable swept across his face as he watched Blake approach.

“Does this have some purpose, Blake?” Avon asked, but his voice was softer than Blake imagined he’d meant it to be.  Tarrant and Leonard scooted hastily to the side, out of Blake’s way.

“Slight change to the programme.”  He paused with a mere foot between them.  “It stops spinning when you want it to.”  And then he reached out, closing a hand gently around Avon’s forearm, and leaned in and kissed him.

It was more fragile even than Tarrant’s first kiss had been, and a thousand times better.  And a thousand times more painful.  Avon didn’t move an inch, didn’t draw away, didn’t press closer.  Blake slid his hand carefully up to Avon’s elbow, and felt Avon trembling.

Blake wanted to reach up with his other hand and cup Avon’s face.  To pull him closer and kiss him harder, to slide his arm around Avon’s waist and murmur nonsense into Avon’s mouth.  He felt more aroused than he had in years and he felt like his heart was being pried out of his chest with a knife.  

He steeled himself and pulled carefully back, staring into Avon’s eyes.  Avon looked devastated.  There was silence in the clearing.

“It stops when you want it to?” Vila asked, as if from very far away.  Blake heard the bottle spin against the forest floor, and stop.

“Nice try, Vila,” Dayna said sarcastically, but she sounded amused.

“Hey, the bottle stopped at you!  You know the rules, Dayna…”

Avon stared back at Blake.  He drew a shuddering breath, and then turned and walked swiftly away, pulling his arm out of Blake’s grasp.

~*~

Blake finally found him, alone, in a secluded spot between the trees.  He was standing, feet planted firmly, his back to Blake and his arms crossed over his chest.  The light filtering through the forest was evening gold.  A small, opened box of hephezoiden sat just to the right of his feet.  Three empty bottles leaned against it.

“Avon.”

“What do you want?”

The reply was whip-quick.  Blake shut his eyes and rubbed at his forehead, wondering what would be best to say, and then stepped closer.  

“I hope I didn’t embarrass you,” he said cautiously.

“Embarrass me?”  Avon laughed shortly and took another swig from the bottle in his hand.  “I don’t think anything could embarrass me.  At this point I have very little left in the way of pride.”

“What on earth—?”

Avon took another drink and then turned to face Blake.  His eyes were blazing.

“How many times did I promise to leave you, Blake?” he snapped, and Blake blinked, surprised to hear his earlier thoughts echoing back at him.  “How many times did I tell you I wanted the _Liberator_?”

The question apparently wasn’t rhetorical.  Avon was staring at him expectantly.  Blake shrugged.  “You did,” he said.  “You got command and you got the ship.”

“And destroyed it.”  Another swig from the bottle.  Blake eyed it and wondered whether Avon had built up a tolerance to alcohol during the years they’d been apart.  He’d never drunk much on the _Liberator_ , but he seemed steady enough now _._  “Do you know how, Blake?”

“Sorry?”

Avon was glaring at him.  “Do you know how I destroyed the _Liberator_?”

“The others didn’t say much about it,” Blake answered.  “Vila told me it exploded.”

“Mm.”  Avon stepped closer, put a hand to Blake’s chest.  “But he didn’t say how.”

“No.”

Avon turned away and raised the bottle again.  It was empty.  He looked at it in disgust and dropped it next to the others and, to Blake’s relief, didn’t reach for another.

“I said I wanted to leave you.  I said I wanted the _Liberator._ The ship is destroyed and here I am.  Right back here.”

“ _You came here_ , Avon,” Blake said, letting annoyance cover the flare of hurt.  “I didn’t ask you to come back for me.”

“What else could I do?”  Avon’s voice was soft.  

Blake wished he could see Avon’s face, and since he couldn’t, set a hand gently on Avon’s shoulder.  Avon twitched and pulled away, and Blake let his hand fall to his side.

“We need to have this conversation, Avon,” he said firmly.  “We’ve barely spoken ten words to each other since you came here.”

“Since I shot that Federation officer.”

“Dammit, Avon, what do you _want_?”

“I want you, Blake.”  Blake felt the world stop turning.  Avon, still facing away, laughed harshly.  “Isn’t it obvious?”

“No.”  His throat was dry.  He cleared it, and it was loud in the silence.  “All those years, Avon.  How—?”

“I hate it,” Avon said.  Blake, who’d started to reach out for him again, stilled.  “I want you and I hate it.  And I wanted to escape you.”  He drew an unsteady breath.  “And I wanted to impress you.  I wanted to succeed, I wanted to prove I could succeed...and I’m not even sure what that means now.”  He cleared his throat and continued.  “Instead I failed at everything I set out to accomplish.”  His tone was horribly conversational.  He bent and withdrew another bottle from the box.

“How much have you had to drink?” Blake asked, and Avon waved a hand at the empty bottles.

“Count them for me,” he answered carelessly.  “I had a crew, a ship, a bolt hole...plans, _Blake_ , I had plans, worthy of you.  I destroyed them all, and I came crawling back to you because I had no choice and I hate that too.”

“Do you think I _don’t_?” Blake burst out, wanting to howl, or hit something, or take hold of Avon and shake him until his teeth rattled.  “Did you think I _ever_ wanted you to stay when you didn’t want to?  Did you think I wanted you to come back for me when you wanted me gone?  Did you think I wanted you to show up here, if it was going to make you miserable?  I _never_ contacted you, Avon, because you made it _crystal clear_ how you felt about me.”

“And,” Avon said softly, as though Blake hadn’t shouted himself breathless, “now I’m back, and being around you...is so good it’s painful.  I’m happy and I hate that too.”

His voice hung in the air for a moment, and then Blake sagged back against a tree and shut his eyes, wishing vaguely that Avon could carry on a conversation without making it into a series of emotional gravity loops.  He didn’t think he’d ever swung this fast from elation to despair, and back, and back.  Not even in the old days, when Avon had routinely caught and held Blake on the flight deck, close enough to kiss, only to release him and walk away.

“Why did you shoot Arlen?” Blake asked, finally, not opening his eyes.

“She was a spy.”

“How did you know?  She passed my test.”

Avon snorted.  “Not much of a test, was it, Blake?”

“ _How did you know_?”

Avon sighed, dropping his chin to his chest, and seemed to see the beer bottle forgotten in his hand, still unopened.  He raised it and pried the lid off, tossing it back into the box.  “Does it matter?”

“Does it _matter_?  You _shot_ someone, someone you’d never even met.”

Avon shrugged.  “I was right.”

“That doesn’t justify it!  If you’d been wrong, what then?”

“I wasn’t.  It was the way—”  Avon bit off the end of his sentence so quickly Blake worried he might choke.

“Tell me, dammit.”

Avon took a swig from the new bottle.

“We _need_ to have this conversation,” Blake repeated.  “I need to know who I can trust.”

“Including me?”

Blake paused.  “I do trust you.”

Avon laughed.  “Trust has always been a problem of yours, Blake.”

“ _How did you_ —”

“It was in her eyes, the way she looked at you.”  He shrugged again, and the black leather stretched and gaped briefly across his shoulders.  “It was obvious.”  He turned, at last, and grinned at Blake.  His eyes looked haunted.  “And then she swung her gun round to point at your back.  You couldn’t see it.  I shot her.”  He raised an eyebrow.  “And then Deva shot me—”

“He shot at you,” Blake corrected.  “He missed.”

Avon bared his teeth in something so far from a smile, Blake almost recoiled from it.  “He seems very loyal to you.”

Blake gaped, and then swore and ran a hand through his hair.  “Hell, Avon.  Are you _jealous_?”

“Oh, I’m any number of things.”  Avon took another long swig from the bottle, then threw it aside and advanced on Blake.  “Relieved, happy, angry, embarrassed.”  The bottle rolled across the ground, its contents spilling across the dirt.  “Jealous,” Avon hissed into Blake’s face, and then pressed him hard against the tree and kissed him.  It was furious and messy and Blake couldn’t breathe and he caught hold of Avon’s face so Avon couldn’t pull away and end it.  Avon snarled wordlessly and bit at Blake’s lip.  “You knew that,” he gasped, and kissed Blake again.  “You knew that when you kissed Tarrant.”

“I didn’t know, Avon,” Blake gasped back, when he could.  

“You hoped.”  Avon’s hands slid down Blake’s sides to his hips, and one slid further, squeezing gently at Blake’s erection.  Blake heard himself make a noise like a dying man and broke away for breath.

“I didn’t—know you were watching.”

Avon dipped his head and bit at Blake’s throat, and Blake felt himself begin to shake apart.  

“ _Liar_.”

Avon undid Blake’s trousers and Blake wrapped a hand around the base of Avon’s skull, pulling him closer and burying his face in Avon’s neck.  He smelled wonderful, he smelled like Avon, and Blake had had no idea just how much he’d missed him until now.  Avon turned his head and bit gently at the tip of his ear, and Blake moaned as, up against a tree and with the sounds their people still laughing in the distance, Avon jerked him off.

Blake came back to himself gradually.  He was clutching at Avon’s shoulder for balance, and the fingers of his other hand were pressing into the back of Avon’s neck so tightly they’d cramped.  It must have been painful, but Avon didn’t seem to mind.  His arms were around Blake’s waist, holding him patiently.  Blake leaned further back against the tree, taking some of his weight off Avon, and sliding an arm around Avon’s shoulders to keep him from stepping away.  He reached between them with the other hand, fingers still a little stiff, but Avon pushed his hand aside.

“No,” he said.

Blake pulled him closer instinctively.  “Why?”

Avon shifted his arm down to the small of Blake’s back, where there was slightly more room between Blake’s back and the tree, and settled his other hand on Blake’s hip.  He wasn’t unaroused: Blake could feel Avon’s erection pressed against his thigh.  Avon leaned gently into Blake and sighed.

“The _Liberator_ was destroyed,” he said, into Blake’s hair, “because I flew it through a viscous cloud of particles against the advice and better judgement of everyone on board, including myself.  Or it would have been against my own better judgement,” he added, “had I been in a fit state to judge anything at all.”

Uncertain of where this story might be headed, and how much comfort Avon might find to be too much, Blake settled for tightening his arm around Avon’s shoulders.  He ran the fingers of his other hand gently up and down Avon’s wrist, and Avon’s hand shook slightly, his fingers digging into Blake’s hip.

“Why?” he asked again.

“I’d received a message,” Avon said, “that could have been from you.  In fact, I was convinced…”

“Avon.”

“So was Orac.  It was from Servalan, of course.  She stranded us on an artificial planet and took the _Liberator_.  She didn’t realise that by that point it was dying.  And she’d booby-trapped the base.  Cally was killed in the explosion.  I wasn’t even there, I was out…”

“Avon.  Stop.”

“I’m sorry, Blake,” Avon said.  

Blake shut his eyes, and then laced his fingers through Avon’s.  “I’m sorry too.”

Avon pulled away slightly, and Blake caught hold of the back of his jacket.  Avon pressed his lips to Blake’s cheek, just next to his ear, and then disentangled their fingers and retrieved his arm from behind Blake’s back.  He carefully did Blake’s trousers back up, the set of his shoulders tired.

Blake caught at his hands.  “What about you, though?”

Avon sighed again, and then kissed him again, very gently.  “Maybe next time.”

“Next time?” Blake asked, feeling his heart jerk at the words, and prepared himself for the inevitable disappointment.

Avon smiled at him, a little crookedly.  “Oh yes.  If you thought I was going to let you wander back to that circle and snog Tarrant again—”

“It wasn’t part of any plan,” Blake answered, light-headed.

“Nothing ever is.  Certainly,” Avon’s smile grew wider, “not with you involved.”

“I could say the same about you.”

“Yes,” Avon agreed.  “I imagine you could.”


End file.
